In the mid-80s I was one of the many idealistic college kids who interned with the UFW for a summer. I got to hang out with him a number of times. His son-in-law ran the NYC-based media campaign and Cesar would come for planning meetings but also to visit his daughter and grandkids. She made great cheese enchiladas and all of us would talk late into the night as he told stories.

I do remember thinking—and asking—why the sainted VP Dolores Huerta never actually seemed all that involved, at least not to the point of ever coming East that summer to participate in NYC-based media strategy meetings. It was explained she was needed back in California.¹ I never met her. I remember not being surprised at all that she didn’t ascend to the UFW presidency when Cesar died. It went instead to the son-in-law who had led our office.

My direct supervisor was a schlub and sexist pig. He was always making inappropriately suggestive comments to the young female interns, which they universally laughed off. They were all smart, confident women with futures who weren’t going to be put off by him. I was the only male intern that summer and he put me in shitty assignments, pressuring me to drop out. I assume I was seen as competition and indeed I did start dating a fellow intern (the only reason I put up with his behavior and made it through the summer). I see he’s still with the UFW, now listed as first vice president, which is not at all inspiring.

It was perhaps the most dysfunctional office culture I’ve ever seen. The union’s influence had obviously declined since the heady days of RFK marching with Cesar in huge rallies. They seemed to jump from fad to fad hoping to recapture attention. That year direct marketing was all the rage in business circles and the UFW was jumping in with both feet. We would spend hours in meetings setting unrealistic expectations, then break our own guidelines to “meet” them. I’d be called out for trying to do things the way we had agreed. I remember wondering if any of the office work I did that summer actually made a jot of difference. Helping to organize East Coast appearances of Cesar was definitely the highlight of the summer—well, that and the girlfriend and getting to hang out in New York City all the time.

I do have to wonder now if some of the dysfunction and sexism in the office was ultimately related to Cesar’s repeated molestation of children.² Did he foster a culture in which we laughed off bad behavior and didn’t question poor management?

I don’t want to exaggerate the ease of the transition. I remember an elderly Friend who opposed a proposal to hold business meetings at another time than the Sunday school hour. She argued — and I think this is nearly verbatim — “We tried that back in 1937 and it didn’t work.” As much as I wanted to laugh out loud, I had to acknowledge that her entire history at the meeting exemplified selfless service.

https://blog.canyoubelieve.me/2019/03/trustworthy-part-four-churches-choices.html

I must admit that the world of YouTube stars is foreign to me. This is essentially a webcam vlog post but the lighting and hair and costuming is meticulous. Her notes include affiliate links for the dress she’s wearing ($89 and yes, they ship internationally), a 8 1/2 minute video tutorial about curling you hair in her vintage style (it has over 33,000 views). If you follow her on Instagram and Twitter you’ll soon have enough details on  lipstick and shoe choices to be able to fully cosplay her.

But don’t laugh too much, because in between the self presentation tips, Kellgren-Fozard tackles really hard subjects–growing up gay in school, living with disabilities–in ways that are approachable and intimate, funny and instructive. And with a quarter million YouTube followers, she’s reaching people with a message of kindness and inclusion and understanding that feels pretty Quakerly to me. Margaret Fell liked herself a red dress sometimes and it’s easy to argue George Fox would be a YouTuber today.

Bonus:  Jessica Kellgren-Fozard will host a live Q&A chat on her Quakerism this coming Monday. If I’m calculating my timezones correctly, it’ll be noon here on the U.S. East Coast. I plan to tune in.

Here in no order and with no attribution (sorry future meme researchers) are some of my favorite re-workings. The Birdcage version made us laugh out loud so much that we knew we had to rewatch it that night.

And finally, a sand sculpture made on Island Beach State Park after the budget standoff ended and the beach reopened: 

The Hipster Conservative writes the definitive guide. This is a bit close for comfort but we’re supposed to be able to laugh at ourselves, right?

Explain the personal conflict you experience between your evangelical roots and what you now truly believe is a devastating challenge to those formerly-held beliefs. Suggest that instead of being so quick to oppose the issue, Christians should extend “grace” (don’t define) and a “generous response.” Above all, they should “re-evaluate” their views in light of this challenge. Remember: “Questioning” is a one-way street.

Via my wife Julie (of course)

I walk around, tears in eyes, looking looking for a changed world. See students in goatees, so beat, but they’re smiling, they don’t know, don’t care, you’ve been reduced to a fashion. But you’re here, in the air we breathe, that smell of liberation, of just stand up and laugh and prank and listen to the soul sex spirit bursting within. Smile through the solitary puritanism that keeps everyone apart.

But where are you remembered? Where’s the drum circles? Needing something now, I buy the latest Waldman anthology in bookstore, thirtieth street train station, full of time magazine, hustler, romance novels, lottery tickets. Cashier looks at book, says someone else just bought it too. Oh joy, no drum circles but at least other lost souls not knowing how to share the loss but to remember the immortal words, the words now history, set forever in twelve point times to be read as another Dead White Male poet.

I tell cashier, friendly middle aged black woman that he—points to your out-of-focus head in photo of Corso, the Orlovskys, Kerouac—is dead. “Who is it?” “Allen Ginsburg.” “Oh, that’s him, hmm?” I say, I hope, that there’ll be a lot of people buying these books now, but know yet another illustrated history of Vietnam will be their best seller.

Nightime now. I can’t help it, I look to the sky to see if there’s a new star in the firmament. But overcast, smoggy, orange-skied Germantown doesn’t open to the cliché.

I miss you. You taught so much. How to combine poetry and liberation and politics and the search for wondrous lovely spirit. Since I first saw you speak—1988 Rutgers, Radical Student Conference—I’ve become activist nonviolence publisher, Quaker seeker. You spoke to me, told me I could spin my own life of joy if only I could be open and humble, ready to laugh, but also ready to take lightening bolts upon my head for standing up in row-after-row movie theater America, watch us perform, give us six bucks America.

In new book you say prescription for this America is:

more art, meditation, lifestyles of relative penury,
avoidance of conspicuous consumption that’s
burning down the planet.

To that I say merely, ‘a‑okay,” let’s get back to work. I love you Allen. Peace be with you.

Recovered via Archive.org cache.